The Art of Substitution
by Enige-iets
Summary: AU Garden is an Art School ON HYATUS! Read my profile for a better explanation, but I have no time basically.  -Iets


A/N: This is not - as the site would suggest - my first fic on this site, it is in fact my thirty-eth! I decided to post this under a different username because my other account is absolutely full of crap and I wanted to save this one for fics I actually intend on continuing xD (That doesn't go to say that - should you guess my other account name - I will be discontinuing _all_ of the fics on that account, just the crappy ones :]).

Anywhos, I've been rambling for far too long and I hope you can forgive me. This is my latest fiction: The Art of Substitution.

Enjoy,

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><p>The Art of Substitution.<p>

SCHOOL OF THE ARTS.

The double doors opened easily on well oiled hinges and Seifer slipped inside. He blinked a little to help adjust his eyes to the low lighting and stuffed his hands in his pockets. It was the first day of school and he was supposed to be in Music 101, but he was tired and still annoyed at Cid and Matron for cajoling him into their stupid School of the Arts so he'd decided to go somewhere else instead. He'd decided to investigate the auditorium and if it didn't meet his standards he'd file his drop out notice this afternoon. His 'art' was music, composition and performance, so he'd been enrolled in one of the many music classes Cid had devised to help students and talented people reach their 'full potential'. Seifer could already play his instruments, compose his own concerto and beat the stuffing out of any grumpy old sax-teacher. So to hell with the lessons.

The auditorium was already in use it appeared and a group of dancers were leaping about on the stage, rushing about in a disorganised manner that reminded him a lot of bees. They didn't appear to be paying any attention to the music and instead of moving as one organised group they were merely copying one another and occasionally gravitating in the same general direction. He took a seat to watch and hopefully amuse himself.

The group continued on its merry way for quite some time before the music was stopped and a greying lady got up on stage. She said something unintelligible and a blonde girl was moved to the front. She was wearing ballet shoes and had her hair in a painfully tight bun. Seifer got the feeling this one was going to a fantastic dancer and an even better stick in the mud.

Indeed she danced well and the rest of the group was set to follow her, few could keep the pace and those who couldn't were taken from the stage until a golden few were left. It was now obvious that this was an audition. And on the first day as well. Seifer moved a few rows closer until he could properly make out faces and committed the blonde girl to memory. He'd tell her later how stiff her dancing looked, if only to test his 'stick in the mud' theory.

At last the music stopped and the dancing did too. Which was lucky really, he wanted to find out what the judges had to say and he'd been on the verge of falling asleep.

"Trepe, was it?" Cid's familiar voice said, "Thank you very much for your time, you've danced very well and clearly have potential. Would you consider yourself to be a versatile dancer?"

"Yes." Good lord, the girl's voice was as cold as ice. Seifer snuck a little closer, his curiosity far outweighing the dangers of being discovered by Cid. "There is no dance that I cannot perform."

Seifer raised an eyebrow. Wow, those were arrogant words if ever he'd heard them and she was setting her bar _very_ high. He could almost feel the challenges wafting off Cid from here. Cid cleared his throat, "Very well, we shall put that theory to the test, welcome to the Balamb Garden School of the Arts."

Trepe bowed and then walked off stage. Seifer got up and made to leave, he didn't really care much about the other dancers, he had his victim for the year and now that she'd vacated the scene it was time for him to scarper before he was caught.

"Almasy."

Seifer flinched and stopped in his bid for the doors. Well that was that then. He turned on the spot and fixed his biggest grin in place. Cid was turned round in his seat and was frowning at him. "What are you doing in here?"

"I was considering my other options, Sir."

"You want to be a dancer?" Cid's tone was slightly incredulous, which wasn't really surprising as Seifer had never been known to revel in dancing. Or anything really.

"Not at all, I was thinking of going into judging. You know, the sort of thing I could do _after_ graduation."

The blonde had reappeared to retrieve her water bottle and had stopped to watch and listen. Seifer fought back a chuckle; girls just couldn't help themselves when faced with a rebel.

"You're meant to be in a lesson. Music 101 I believe." Cid said, pulling what appeared to be a timetable from his pocket and squinting at it in the dim light. "With Mr McClain."

"Cid, with all due respect, I don't need lessons from some old fart." Seifer said, clearly exasperated. There were gasps from the other people in the room, although whether over his use of the headmaster's first name or his insult to his teacher, it was unclear. "I might be majoring in four subjects, but that doesn't mean I need to be taught how to play something I already _know_ how to play."

"Never the less, you should be attending the lesson to show respect to the-"

"If that's all the lessons are for then I'm definitely not going."

"Seifer!" Cid stood up, glaring. He was red faced even in the near darkness and was clearly enraged at Seifer's lack of respect or decorum. "If you're not going to any of the bloody lessons then why are you even in this school!"

"Because you forced me." Seifer stated calmly. It was very rare that he managed to get Cid angry enough to actually turn red so he certainly wasn't going to spoil it this time by laughing. "I'll go to the composition classes, but don't expect me to take cues from someone who isn't even in the same league as me."

"You'll go to the composition classes."

"Yes."

"Every one."

"Most of them."

"All of them or I'm expelling you."

"Most of them or I'm dropping out."

The rest of the room had fallen into a silence. They had no idea of the relationship between this kid and the headmaster but it was clear they went beyond student and teacher. Cid chewed his cheek, clearly considering the weight of Seifer's threat. At last he nodded.

"What are you going to do in your frees then? Practice?" The question was placed with a dubious expression, as though it was entirely impossible for such a thing to occur where Seifer was concerned.

"Lord, no." Seifer laughed and turned around again to leave. "I thought maybe I'd cook something up for you. Some trouble perhaps, you know something… Inspiring."

Cid shook his head as Seifer's shadow left the doorway. He was always telling that boy to be inspiring, but he had never had pyrotechnics or sadism in mind. Oh well, as long as the kid graduated and got out of his hair then he was game for whatever… Within reason.

* * *

><p>"Hey," Seifer called, jogging up to his two friends, Raijin and Fuujin. They were sat on a wall outside the cafeteria eating sandwiches and swigging red bull. Raijin waved animatedly to him and Fuujin merely blinked. She was never known to be a morning person and in Fuujin's book anything before 3 o'clock was the morning. It was presently 1:30 and Fuujin was exhausted. School had always taken it out of the nocturnal teenager and the first day never got any better.<p>

"How are you guys? How's the martial art class coming?"

"It's great, ya know!" Raijin spluttered around a mouthful of ham and cheese sandwich. Fuujin cringed beside him as crumbs flew everywhere. "I never woulda thought the old man woulda let us, ya know. Considering our history and everything ya know…"

"Nah," Seifer shook his head and took a seat on the other side of Fuujin, away from the flying bits of sandwich. "He's a stickler for potential. He loves a good brawl anyway and watching someone who's good at it always beats watching someone who's not."

"SADIST." Fuujin grumbled and took a small sip of coke.

"Yeah, but give the man his due," Seifer took the coke from Fuujin's grip and drank some himself. Normally this would have amounted to treason as far as Fuujin was concerned, but with the state of Raijin's mouth, she didn't much fancy drinking form his bottle either. She let Seifer's thievery slide. "He's good at spotting potential. Besides, if he didn't know what he was looking for none of us would be here, we'd all still be busting people's teeth in high school."

His two friends nodded simultaneously. It was true. They had been sorely in need of a break, having spent most of their school career bunking off lessons and spending more time beating the crap out of people for a pittance than they really ought to have done. It hadn't made them any friends with the authorities, but Cid had offered them a place in his school and 'if they promised to play nicely with the other kids' he could give them a chance in a career they were good at. Seifer had been drafted into the musical section and Raijin and Fuujin went into Martial Arts.

"Really like this place, ya know." Raijin admitted, glancing at the other two with a pleading gaze. "Let's try not to fuck this up, okay?"

Seifer and Fuujin nodded, and they fell into a silence. This was a last chance after all. They had to try not to fuck this up.

* * *

><p>"So I told him he could 'stick it where the sun don't shine' and that if he didn't like my painting then he'd really hate my high school options!"<p>

Quistis glanced at the bouncing girl stood next to her, seemingly smothered from head to foot in bright vermillion paint. She had said her name was Selphie Tilmitt and she was majoring in 3D picture art. She loved ponies, dogs, painting, yellow and mini-dresses. When she was 5 she got stuck up a tree and stayed there for 3 hours until a brave attempt at descent caused the branch to break and she took the quick way down, landing herself in hospital with a broken knee. She'd coloured her cast in yellow and pink with crayons and had been evicted from her hospital bed by a man with typhoid not long afterwards on the premonition that she was obviously doing fine and was making a nuisance of herself. She was adopted, had one brother, 6 cats, two dogs and a goldfish called harry. Her dad was unhappy with her choice in career as he wanted her to be a dentist and she'd once leapt from a three story building into the sea without a problem. There was so much to know about this girl that appeared to be incredibly important and none of it related to the question Quistis had originally asked: "Who is Seifer Almasy?"

They reached the cafeteria and bounced up to the counter with all the food. A man with a pony tail and a cowboy hat was leaning up against the wall and talking to a group of giggling girls. Quistis was about to make a comment on the general population of the school being ridiculously over sexed, when Selphie squealed and ran up to him, bowling through the crowd of girls and throwing her arms round the man's neck, peppering his face with kisses. Quistis felt her jaw drop open as the girls surrounding the two all assumed angry looks.

"I didn't know you were coming here!" Selphie gushed, beaming at the now slightly dazed looking man, "Why didn't you tell me?"

"I wanted to surprise you." He smiled, coming to his senses at the chance of impressing a lady. "I couldn't let my favourite girl go without me, could I?"

Selphie's smile turned to an immediate frown. "So what about these others? Are they your favourite girls too?"

Quistis chuckled as the man's expression paled, but he answered strongly none the less. "I was simply comparing them to your beauty. They had no chance." He finished it off with a grin and Selphie seemed to be placated. She grabbed him by the arm and dragged him away from the girls and over to Quistis to show her.

"Quisty, this is Irvy," She beamed while Irvy straightened himself up and readjusted his hat. "Irvy, this is Quisty. She's a dancer."

"A pleasure to meet you, Quisty." He smiled and stuck out a hand, "I'm Irvine kineass, majoring in carpentry, among other things."

"Likewise," Quistis shook his hand, "But my name is not Quisty, I'm Quistis Trepe and I'm majoring in Ballet and choreography."

"Nice." Irvine nodded appreciatively. Selphie bounced up and down beside him, practically pulsating with confined pleasure. Irvine sighed and turned to relieve her of her agony; anymore bouncing and his arm was going to be torn off at the shoulder. "What is it?"

"I'm going to ask Headmaster Cid if he'll allow me to organise a fresher's party!" Selphie squealed and Quistis grinned. At least she wouldn't be the one organising everything this year. Irvine however, had paled and begun to shake his head. "Oh no, Selphie, give it a couple of weeks rest, please!"

"But no one has anything to do right now!" Selphie complained, sticking her bottom lip out and wibbling it expertly. "This is the perfect time to get everyone together and socialise!"

"Babe, I'm sure everyone can find their own friends." Irvine said.

"I think it's a great idea." Quistis piped up. Why on earth was Irvine being so unco-operative? Certainly the look he had just given her hinted betrayal, desperation and mild fear. "Why not have a gathering?"

"See!" Selphie crowed, sticking her tongue out and detached herself from Irvine's arm, latching onto Quistis instead. "Stop being such a stick in the mud Irvy. Quisty will help me, won't you?" She turned imploring eyes on Quistis, while Irvine shook his head vigorously in the background.

Quistis nodded and Irvine's expression turned to one of defeat. Selphie turned to him too. "And as my boyfriend you have no choice."

"Alright, darlin'." He consented, rolling his eyes and shooting Quistis an accusatory look. "As long as you don't go overboard."

"Don't worry," Selphie beamed and slipped her arm through Irvine's and stringing both her new volunteers along as she began her march through the cafeteria. "I won't. But your first task is to round up volunteers to help me organise the party!"

The unwitting Quistis and the painfully knowledgeable Irvine resigned themselves to their fate at the hands of the new party organiser.

* * *

><p>Cid sighed and sat himself down at his desk. It was only lunchtime and already his work load had swamped him. He was never going to be able to get through this today. It was going to have to wait until some other time. Tomorrow perhaps. Or maybe he could set more work on his secretaries? He had three of them anyway for Christ sake. But then again if he wanted anything doing well he would have to do it himself.<p>

He picked up the first piece of paper; it was the register of absentees for that day. Administrative work any other day of the year, but he always made a point of getting to know his students and what better way than assessing who had skipped out on the very first day?

Unsurprisingly there were very few names on the list. Two, in fact. One boy called Squall Leonhart, but Cid had already been informed by President Loire that Squall would be a few days late due to his residency in Esthar being ransacked and Squall's prise instrument, a cherry wood violin being damaged. It would take a little while for the violin to be repaired and so Squall was spending the few days repairing the damage to his windows and reassessing his home security.

The second name on the list was unsurprising in its nature but entirely vexing. Seifer Almasy. It was not two months ago that Cid had put to Seifer the idea of Art School. It was a perfect way for him to perfect what he was good at and to gain a degree and access to jobs after graduation. Seifer had taken a little while to warm to the idea, but had eventually agreed to give it a go. And he was on the absent list already.

Cid sighed and ran a hand down his face. Lord almighty, he was going to get himself into a huge amount of trouble if he decided to allow this sort of behaviour from one of his students and penalised others for bad conduct. But then again he was loath to throw Seifer out. He had promised he would never do that and he intended to keep that promise.

There was a knock on the door and he called for whomever to enter. His wife, Edea entered, closing the door behind her. She took one look at the pile of papers and folders littering his desk and sighed, giving him a sympathetic look.

"It's always the same, every year." She said, coming forwards and beginning to sort through the papers, taking the sheet from his hands, giving it an unimpressed look and then sorting it into a pile. "You should probably think about hiring more secretaries, dear. You're not getting any younger."

"I am still young enough." Cid grumbled, sitting a little straighter in his chair and pulling the nearest pile towards him. It was comprised mostly of reports on the recently renovated cafeteria; project speed, wastage, total cost etc.

"I'm only thinking of your future." Edea said, grabbing a pen and the pad of post-it notes off the corner of the desk and labelling each pile of paper according to content. "Now tell me about Seifer. I had thought he'd promised to be good this year and come to school."

"He _is_ in school." Cid mumbled, already engrossed in the report. Edea didn't see what was so interesting about them, but Cid needed no less than 3 lines to become entirely encompassed by any particular document. She frowned at that, he was meant to be holding a conversation with her.

"Then why does it say he's not?"

"Because he's not going to his lessons. He's roaming the campus instead."

Edea heaved a sigh and put her hands on her hips, glaring at her husband until he took notice of her and put down the report.

"Then you must persuade him otherwise."

"How can I, Edea?" Cid asked, throwing up his hands, exasperated. "He's a loose bloody canon! I have given him and his friends enough chances by now. Luckily they appear to have some brains although he doesn't!"

"Oh you know he's smart." Edea defended, "We're obviously just not finding things that appeal to him. That's all. He just needs some motivation, that's all."

"He needs a good kick up the arse is what he needs." Cid growled, picking up the report again.

"Mr Kramer!" Edea gasped, horrified. "Do not talk about the poor boy like that! You know what he's been through! There is nothing else we can do but support him! None of this 'kicking him up the backside' thank you..."

Cid did not reply and, with one last disapproving look at him, Edea turned and left the room. She would come back with coffee and help him with some of that work. He would undoubtedly be happier to talk with her once the pressure had been relieved.

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><p>AN: *Clears throat* So... I realise it was quite short, but please forgive that slight hiccup and look to the review button and the story alert/favourite option, you know you can't resist :)

-iets


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